About Me

I feel I am able to communicate
well and I have a good grounding
in people skills.......Basically
all humanity is the same!
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The foundation of this blog was cemented by the Assassination of Hrant Dink on 19.01.07. I was listening to Setrak Setrakian’s rendition of Arno Babajanian’s composition, Elegy. So
moved by Hrant’s shortened life by the virtue of speaking his mind that I wrote the poem, ‘Without You’ with Hrant's family in mind. The subject matter of the recognition of the ‘Genocide of the Armenians in 1915,’ is very much at the heart and the minds of Armenian's Internationally.
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I want to say: 'Thank you,'
to Keith for the Creation
and Launch of,
Seta's Armenian.blogspot.com
and Armenag for the sources
of information.
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If you feel it would be appropriate, please include a link to my Blog from your Site. I would like my Blog to be as eclectic as possible and include material from as many and different sources so long as it is relevant to my subject matter.

About My Blog

This well-established Blog is worth visiting on a regular basis for a wealth of information of interest to Armenian nationals and to the Armenian Diaspora world-wide. Although it has a particular role in promoting international recognition of the Genocide, the Blog encompasses much more and includes many articles of general appeal to all those concerned with Armenian affairs. Much of the content is difficult or impossible to find elsewhere and the long list of links provided gives easy access to a plethora of material on social, political, religious, educational and cultural matters, and many news items from around the world.

Wednesday, 29 March 2017

WHY ARE GOOD SAMARITANS RARE IN CHINA? COMMUNISM, CONFUCIANISM OR WHAT? DOES CHRISTIANITY MAKE A DIFFERENCE?------------------------------------------------------------

You see an injured, small child. Run over by a car. She lies bleeding on the road. Do you stop to help? No. You walk on. And so do several others.

Incredible? It happened in Shanghai, writes Calum MacLeod in The Times. Only one case amongst many. Chinese people do not like playing Good Samaritan, apparently. They fear being involved, accused and being sued for the accidents. The Bad Samaritan syndrome. To be fair, not peculiar only to China. It arose in the US years ago. Sue, grab it and run is the concept…

A personal anecdote. My Chinese friend Jian while staying in London borrowed a bicycle from his English landlady and went for a ride to Gypsy Hill. On the way, he fell off his bike. A bit shocked, he lay on the road. Two kind English ladies stopped and helped him. Looked after him. He was amazed: ‘It wouldn’t have happened in China’ he told me. ‘People would have been afraid.’

True, the Good Samaritan described in St Luke’s Gospel, chapter 10, operated in a very different culture. No fear of financial responsibility. (On the contrary, the Good Samaritan paid the innkeeper to look after the wounded man.) Rather, it was religious and racial hatred he had to overcome. Samaritans and Jews abominated each other. Jews despised Samaritans as an alien, bastard and infidel bunch. Descendants of colonists imported by the Assyrians after the conquerors had deported ten Israelite tribes into remote places of their empire. (They never came back.) But Samaritans regarded themselves as true Jews and even desecrated the rival Jerusalem Temple. A wall of reciprocal, deep loathing divided the two races. Neither the Jewish priest nor the Levite stopped to assist the wounded man lying by the road. Although the victim was a fellow Jew they feared ritual pollution. Only the Samaritan ‘Other’ did. Overcoming xenophobia and ritualism, that charming, unforgettable figurehelped.

Is present fear of being sued the only reason for China’s Bad Samaritans? A Chinese writer observed the same selfish, inhuman behaviour 80 years ago, MacLeod writes. So, perhaps it goes deeper. Could it be linked to China’s Confucian heritage? Confucius’ fundamental text, The Analects, distinguishes between gentlemen and the common people. The gentleman was educated, the ordinary people, the ‘small men’ were not. They had no understanding or respect. They behaved differently and had to be treated accordingly.

Buddhism, the other key strand in Chinese culture, is not like that. Compassion is the Buddha, Siddhartha Gautama’s supreme virtue. Unlikely to be approved of by an atheistic regime. Maybe China’s ruling Communist Party, despite its proletarian and peasant ideology, takes after Confucius. The ordinary people lack wisdom, ideological knowledge, therefore they must be dragged along the new path with a strong hand, promises and threats. If callousness and inhumanity are engendered along the way…too bad!

After the vile terrorist attack on Westminster Bridge last week, many ordinary people, passers-by rushed to help the wounded victims. They did not walk by on the other side. They didn’t fear having their clothes smeared with blood. They didn’t think of possibly being sued. Are British people fundamentally, essentially unlike the Chinese? Implausible. National characters differ but humanity is one. Here is a hypothesis: although Christianity is barely a hologram, a simulacrum in Britain today, without real influence or efficacy, a strain of subterraneous Christian virtue endures in society, buried in the people’s consciousness. Folks whose ancestors were at least not pagans but worshippers of the Crucified still retain a substratum of Christian ethics.

To be fair, the Duke of Wellington’s England – 200 years back – was Christian OK yet it partook a great deal of Confucian snobbery. To be a gentleman was to dress, behave and speak in a particular way – and to have money. The Iron Duke, who the priest much admires, was a strong Christian and also a great snob. But I don’t think Wellington would have hesitated to help a suffering, fellow human being in need. That would not have been ‘the decent thing to do’ – for a gentleman and a Christian.

‘Teacher, what shall I do to inherit eternal life?’ a scholar of the Jewish Law asked Jesus in Palestine long ago. The Messiah’s first reply was that the man had to love God with all his heart, mind and strength – and to love his neighbour as himself. Still, the scholar was a hair-splitter – or maybe he had an agenda and wished to lure Jesus into a trap. So he asked: ‘And who is my neighbour?’ Jesus’ reply was not a philosophical definition but a vivid story. A parable whose meaning and power will last till humanity is not totally de-Christianised and de-humanised.

When I was chaplain in Turkey a member of my international congregation was a Japanese girl called Masako. A Christian. She told me that when her fellow Japanese found out she was a Christian they would say things like: ‘Oh! A Christian! So you must be a very good person!’ My own experience of parish life and people – indeed my own self-analysis – has not always led me to feel sanguine in believing that much but…I hope it might be true.

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The making of...Kill The Christians

By Producer Director Robin Barnwell

I had just landed at Rome’s Fiumicino airport en route to film at the monastery of Monte Cassino when I received a phone call. The Series Producer of BBC2’s ‘This World’ was on the line. “Would you be available to make a programme about Christians under threat in the Middle East in Syria, Iraq and Lebanon?” I instinctively said yes but the next morning, as I filmed a dramatic sunrise over the world famous Monte Cassino Abbey, I started to have my doubts. Not another trip to Syria, I despaired, particularly so soon after a three-month trip earlier in the year when a mortar attack destroyed our vehicles. I’m getting older, I admitted to myself, I’m more wary of war zones, surely the BBC could send me somewhere less dangerous? But as I wandered through Monte Cassino’s cloistered courtyards, I considered how, in an increasingly secular Europe, we have lost touch with the roots of the religion that shaped the culture and history of the Western world. The story of the decline of Christianity in the Middle East was really important to tell, especially now with the rise of the so-called Islamic State - IS.

A few months later, I arrived in Iraq laden with the usual trepidation that can niggle when returning to a hostile environment after a period in more tranquil places. As I crossed the hotel lobby in Erbil, the capital of the Iraqi autonomous region of Kurdistan, apprehension transformed to bemusement as I saw Boris Johnson, London’s mayor, bouncing towards me followed shortly afterwards by some fifty Brits in kilts and black tie who were off to celebrate Burns Night.

Reality kicked in the following morning. A few kilometers from the frontline, fighting was visible between Kurdish Peshmerga forces and those of IS. There were large explosions as jets from the United States and various European air forces dropped bombs on IS positions. Within sight of this scene of extreme violence, we got to work filming in a spectacular fourth century Syriac Orthodox monastery surrounded by priests in extraordinary vestments in a place where Christianity had been practiced for sixteen hundred years in a time when the majority of the population was Christian. Father Yusuf, a dedicated follower of Spanish football’s La Liga, was our friendly guide.

The sounds of battle were soon replaced by the beautiful chanting of the monks in Syriac, an ancient language close to that spoken by Christ. As the clergy processed and incense wafted across the church and over its small remaining congregation, I thought about the narrow escape these monks and their monastery had had. Last summer, IS fighters reached the foot of the mountain below the monastery during their advance across the Nineveh Plain. Not far away, another stunning 4th century monastery, Mar Behnam, had been taken over by IS militants. It was blown up and destroyed whilst we were filming ‘Kill the Christians’. The Christian population around Mar Behnam was offered choices by the leaders of the so-called Islamic State: conversion to Islam or the dhimma contract - involving payment of jizya tax. Ominously, the IS statement continued, “if they refuse this they will have nothing but the sword.”

As we filmed more with Christians who had fled IS, a disappearing world revealed itself to us. I realized that my many trips to the Middle East making documentaries for the BBC had not brought me into contact with the region’s ancient Christian communities and that there was so much to learn and understand.

The next challenges was to capture the beauty and atmosphere of the Qadisha Valley, the heartland of the Lebanon’s Maronite Christians, where we wanted to film with a hermit who lived in a remote cave. For well over a thousand years Maronite hermits have lived in this extraordinary valley in the Lebanon’s northeast. There used to be a great number of them but only three continue the tradition today. Our Maronite priest guide warned us that the hermits were not media friendly and that we had to arrive at the right moment as the hermits prayed alone for fourteen hours a day.

We set out on a trek, descending a nerve janglingly steep path adjacent to precipitous drops below snow-capped peaks towards a hermit’s cave. The final approach took us onto a ledge and from there through a door in the rock into a spectacular cave church. Then the good news: Father Dario, who was in his ‘eighties, was willing to be filmed. Extraordinarily, he turned out to be a supporter of Liverpool Football Club and had lived in Brighton. I filled him in on Liverpool’s performances over the previous decade, as religious cave life provides no television, newspapers or radio.

It was getting late and we still had to trek carrying all the camera kit out of the valley. Father Dario, wearing his hair shirt, bid us goodbye from the tiny cell in a part of the cave that he sleeps in. A rock for a pillow lay at the top of a blanket that formed his bed. As we walked down the Holy Valley at sunset, I wondered how long Christianity would be able to survive in the face of persecution and war in its ancient heartland.

Henrikh Mkhitaryan scored the opener on the 73rd minute, Aras Ozbiliz made it 2-0 two minutes later.

Kazakhstan was left with 10 men after Sergey Maliy was sent off for a foul against Mkhitaryan on the 65th minute.

The new film “The Promise”, directed by Northern Irish filmmaker Terry George, who also wrote In The Name of the Father, Some Mother’s Son and The Boxer, is a very powerful epic drama about the Armenian Genocide which took place in 1915. Starring Angela Sarafyan, Oscar Isaac and Christian Bale, “The Promise” takes your standard love triangle romance drama and sets it against the background of the Armenian genocide in the crumbling Ottoman Empire, with both fighting for the affections of Charlotte Le Bon and their own lives. You can see a

The film is to be released in Irish cinemas on April 28th. In USA on the 21st and U.K On 21st.

President Serzh Sarkisian made clear on Saturday that he does not planto leave the political arena after serving out his second and finalterm in office next year.

"I am constantly asked what I am going to do after 2018," Sarkisiansaid, visiting a military base in Nagorno-Karabakh. "I have neverplanned [beforehand] where I will be in the next stage of my life. Ialways found myself in places where I was of greater help to oursecurity."

"I don't know now what the political situation will be like in 2018,but if the political force headed by me wins the upcoming elections,then based on the configuration at that moment I will play a role, insome capacity, in ensuring the security of our people. I don't knowwhat that capacity will be, but I will definitely be of help in someformat," he told soldiers and their parents attending a ceremonythere.

Sarkisian led Karabakh's Armenian-backed forces at the start of theirwar with Azerbaijan and was appointed as Armenia's defense minister in1993. He held this and other top security posts in Yerevan beforebecoming Armenia's prime minister in 2007.

Armenia will switch to the parliamentary system of governmentimmediately after the end of his decade-long presidency in April2018. Sarkisian's political opponents claim that he is intent onholding on to power.

The 62-year-old president has so far not publicly ruled out thepossibility of becoming prime minister next year. The current Armenianpremier, Karen Karapetian, has made no secret of his desire to retainhis post after April 2018.

Some observers have speculated that Sarkisian might only stay on aschairman of the ruling Republican Party of Armenia (HHK) and continuepulling the strings in that capacity. An HHK representative said inNovember that he will lead the party for "many years" to come.

In his speech, a uniform-clad Sarkisian also mentioned the April 2parliamentary elections, urging Armenians vote for a political groupthat has a proven track record on defense and national security. Hedescribed security as "the number one issue" facing Armenia andKarabakh. The HHK's election campaign motto is "Security andProgress."

"We need to have a strong security hand," said Sarkisian. "Populism orweakness at the top of the security pyramid would ruin a wholenation."

"Our security requires strong leadership," he added.

Transportation Monitor WorldwideArmenia's second air company to start operating flights from GyumrisShirak AirportMarch 25, 2017Armenias second air company will operate flights from Gyumris ShirakAirport, the press office of the General Department of Civil Aviationof Armenia reported on Thursday.

Under an agreement with the General Department of Civil Aviation,Taron-Avia will start operating regular and not regular flights inApril 2017.

Before that, flights from Shirak Airport had been operated by two aircompanies - Armenia Air Company and Russias Pobeda.

The launch of Taron-Avia Air Companys flights will create new jobs andcontribute to economic development in the region spurring tourism.

The Armenian government has taken certain steps to develop ShirakAirport. In particular, starting from December 31, 2014, departingpassengers no longer had to pay AMD 10,000 as duty.

On January 1, 2017, air navigation service became 50% cheaper, andweather forecast service became free.

Armenia - International Airports CJSC is planning to invest $3 millionin development of the airports building and infrastructures in 2017.

There are two airports in Armenia Zvartnots in Yerevan and Shirak inGyumri. They are run by the International Airports CJSC in accordancewith the concession management contract signed with the Armeniangovernment in 2001 for 30 years.

The International Airports CJSC belongs to American InternationalAirports, an Argentinas company owned by Eduardo Eurnekian, anArgentine entrepreneur of Armenian descent. ($1 AMD 484.04). 2017Global Data Point.

arka.am

Ostrich farm in Armenia seeks $1.5 million investmentMarch 27.

Roberto Straus, a company that has established an ostrich farm in Armenia, seeks to attract $1.5 million investment to boost output. The company has placed a relevant investment project on the electronic platform of the Ministry of Economic Development and Investment at www.investmentprojects.am .

The company has been working in the Armenian market for almost 10 years, engaged in breeding of ostriches and selling ostrich eggs and meat, which are in demand in the world market because of their useful qualities, including low cholesterol and calories.

The company has acquired more than 10 acres of land with the necessary infrastructure, which allows it not only to breed ostriches, but also to develop its own production of bird feed. To expand its commercial operations the company plans to expand production through attracting investment,

The company intends not only to produce meat and eggs, but also to use all the by-products - leathers, feathers, claws, ostrich fat and even shells (for decorative art painting).-- 0 –

massispost.comPatriarchal Election Déjà Vu in Turkey: Government Meddling in the Election is Inevitable, But Not Decisive

Dr. Hratch TchilingirianOxfordMarch 27, 2017
The election process of a new Armenian Patriarch in Turkey faces the customary state-imposed restrictions, administrative hurdles and arbitrary treatment of the Armenian community. In recent weeks, the situation has been exacerbated by personality clashes and ambitions of the high ranking clergymen at the Patriarchate, who have turned a problem into a divisive major crisis.

The 556-year old Patriarchate is one of the four Hierarchical Sees of the Armenian Apostolic Church.

The problem facing the Armenian community started in July 2008 when the 52-year-old serving Patriarch Mesrob Mutafyan was officially diagnosed with an incurable illness. By then he had been in a vegetative state for some time at the Surp Pirgic Hospital and remains so ever since.

In 2010 Archbishop Aram Ateshian was appointed Patriarchal Vicar with the consent of the Turkish government. This temporary arrangement until the election of a new patriarch turned into an indefinite status quo. The continued uncertainty without a clear sight of elections caused controversies and division within the community.

Under pressure and protests, in order to clear the path of organizing new elections, in October 2016 Patriarch Mesrob was officially declared “retired” by the Patriarchate’s Religious Council.

Archbishop Aram, who was supposed to head the election process, by seeking the government’s permission as a first step, continued to drag on the uncertain situation, which had left the community without a functioning patriarch for almost nine years.

In February of this year, the tensions and internal disagreements, both among the clergy and the laity, reached to a boiling point. Bishop Shahak Mashalian, the chairman of the Patriarchate’s Religious Council, resigned by publishing a fiery letter. He blamed Archbishop Ateshian and certain lay leaders of the Armenian community for the deepening stagnation of the Patriarchate and the community in general.

The highly explosive situation created by Mashalian’s resignation was defused through the mediation of the Catholicos of All Armenians who invited the three bishops of the Patriarchate to Etchmiadzin for consultations and to jointly seek solution to the crisis.

Within days after their return from Etchiadzin, on 15 March, Archbishop Karekin Bekdjian — the most senior bishop of the Patriarchate and the serving Primate of the Armenian Church in Germany — was elected Locum Tenens (deghabah) by 2/3 votes of the Religious Council. According to the agreement reached in Etchmidazin and in accordance to the rules and traditions of the Armenian Church, Archbishop Ateshian was to step down as Patriarchal Vicar immediately after Bekdjian’s election.

However, within minutes of the election of the Locum Tenens, Ateshian produced a letter from the Istanbul Governor’s Office which declared that the election was “not legally possible” and Ateshian remains to be recognized as the official Patriarchal Vicar by the government.

Many in the community, including two Armenian MPs in the Turkish parliament, consider the Istanbul Governor’s Office letter crude meddling and lacking any legal and procedural basis. Archbishop Ateshian and his small circle of supports insist that without the government’s consent no election is valid. This has created a stalemate and tensions are high on all sides.

The Turkish government’s meddling in the process of election of the 85th Patriarch of Istanbul and All Turkey is inevitable, as in the past, but not decisive. The community has the ultimate say as it did nearly 20 years ago.

The last four patriarchal elections in 1950, 1961, 1990 and 1998 were carried out by official directives issued by successive Turkish governments. Since 1923, the government has used state discretion rather than church bylaws as the basis of patriarchal election. All four elections were fraught with government interference, procedural burdens imposed on the community and torturous recognition.

In 1998, the Turkish state refused to approve an election date for some five months, depriving the Armenian community the freedom and inherit right to vote for a new church leader.
Government interference in the election is not only about setting procedures.

During the last election almost 20 years ago, the Armenian community was informed through informal channels that between the two eligible candidates the Turkish state preferred the 72-year-old Archbishop Shahan Sivajian over the charismatic and US-educated Archbishop Mesrob Mutafyan, who was 42 years old at the time.

After the death of Patriarch Karekin Kazanjian (1990-1998), 45 representatives from 38 districts in Turkey had met at the Armenian Patriarchate in March 1998 and elected a 21-member Electoral Committee responsible for organizing the elections. One of the main tasks of such a committee is to negotiate with the Istanbul Governor’s Office for the state required permission to hold church elections.
On 28 April 1998, the Istanbul Governor’s Office ordered a halt to the plans without explanations until further notice. Nevertheless, the community went ahead with the election of a Locum Tenens (deghabah).

An old script is being staged with new actors today.

Similar to the scenario played out on 15 March, in August 1998 Archbiship Mesrob Mutafyan was duly elected Locum Tenens, but the government refused to recognize him, arguing that under Turkish law the eldest and most senior cleric — Archbishop Sivajian at the time — must fill the interim post until a successor is elected.

Media outlets were used to put pressure on the community. The rightwing Turkish media launched a slander campaign against Mutafyan, accusing him of anti-Turkish activities. In one case, Mutafyan filed and won a lawsuit for libel against “Turkiye” newspaper.

The Patriarchate protested the state’s orders to no avail. On the contrary, the government responded with two more memos declaring Sivajian the only recognized interim leader and warning that any resistance to this decision would be prosecuted under the law.

After months of state interference and delays, the Governor of Istanbul — having received the mandatory approval of the Council of Ministers — permitted the 60,000-strong Armenian community in Turkey to proceed with the election on 14 October 1997.

The General Assembly of the Armenian Church Community — made of 10 clergymen and 79 lay delegates representing 15,811 church members — elected Archbishop Mesrob Mutafyan as the 84th Patriarch of Istanbul and All of Turkey. The other candidate, Archbishop Sivajian, whose candidacy was supported by Turkish authorities, received 15 votes.

It is not a secret that the government maintains strict restrictions on the Armenian Church’s activities, as it does on all Christian churches in Turkey. After the coup in 1960, the government dismantled the Armenian Community Central Council, the highest lay body in Turkey, which worked for the interests of the community alongside the Patriarchate. In December 1997, the government ordered the Patriarchate to disband its council of lay advisors and forbade lay delegates from participating in the election for a new Catholicos in Etchmiadzin in 1995. The list of restrictions is long and far reaching. In 1971 the state ordered the closure of the Holy Cross Armenian Seminary, which deprived the Patriarchate of training future priests and church workers.

For 94 years since the founding of the Turkish Republic, the state has persistently curtailed, tightly controlled and closely monitored all the significant rights of the Armenian community that are essential to the viability of their collective life. More than any other area, elections and administration of churches and charities have been most torturous and energy-sapping for the declining Armenian community in Turkey.

The election of the 85th Patriarch of Armenians in Turkey will, no doubt, be held true to precedents established by the state. But, in the end, as in previous elections, the Armenian community shall have the final word as to who will lead the historic See of the Patriarchate of Constantinople — or per Turkish state’s sanctioned title, the “Patriarchate of Istanbul and All Turkey.”

Special for the Armenian Weekly

Documentary about Islamized Survivors of the Armenian Genocide Premieres in IstanbulBy Uzay Bulut

March 23, 2017
A new Turkish documentary about Islamized survivors of the Armenian Genocide premiered in Istanbul on Feb. 9.

The documentary The Children of Vank tells the story of what happened to the few survivors of the 1915 genocide in the province of Dersim (“Tunceli” in Turkish) and of the 1937-38 Dersim massacre.

According to the documentary, the Armenian survivors of these two genocides were exiled by the Turkish government to other places across Turkey.

Due to the forced Turkification and Islamization policies of the Turkish government, the Armenian names of the survivors were changed and they were given Turkish names. They were then made to convert to Islam by reciting the Shahada, the public recitation of Islamic belief that is declared by all converts to Islam. Some were raised as Alevis in Alevi households.

The film is named after the Surp Garabed Vank (Saint Garabed Monastery) in the village of Halvori in Dersim. The word “ Vank ” means monastery in Armenian.

The Surp Garabed Vank , which is believed to have been built in the ninth century, was the only Armenian place of worship in Dersim that was not destroyed in the Armenian Genocide.

The monastery was bombed by Turkish forces in 1937 and its priest was arrested. It was completely demolished in the massacre in 1938 and the priest was brutally murdered—alongside other Armenians and Qizilbash/Alevis in the village of Halvori Vank.

“The Turkish state targeted all Qizilbash/Alevis across Dersim as well as the Christian community in that village in the 1937-38 genocide,” said Kazim Gundogan, the producer of the movie, speaking to the Armenian Weekly. “Almost all of them were killed. That is why, we named the people whose stories we told 75 years after the genocide ‘the children of the monastery ( Vank )’.”

Kazim Gundogan and Nezahat Gundogan, the researchers of the movie, traced the Armenian survivors of these two genocides in the provinces of Konya, Bolu, Istanbul, Izmir, and Dersim and conducted interviews with them. Kazim Gundogan also wrote a book about the Armenians of Dersim entitled The Children of the Priest: Armenians of Dersim 1 . “Our research on Armenians of Dersim is ongoing. We will publish a second book about the stories of the Alevi, Muslim, atheist and Christian Armenians of Dersim at the end of this year,” said Gundogan.

The documentary details the courageous yet traumatic lives of the surviving children and grandchildren of the monastery. It describes their shattered memories, their efforts of searching for their roots and their journey back to Dersim.

Gundogan emphasized that he would like to share the documentary with those who want to learn more about the Armenians of Dersim and the 1938 massacre by organizing premiers and talks about the movie across the world.

Ahmet Ak, who learns about his grandmother’s Armenian identity, says in the documentary: “I think she was so scared that she did not share anything with us. It is so hard to be an Armenian in these lands. And they lived through these difficulties in person so deeply.”

Kazim and Nezahat Gundogan have also produced two ground-breaking documentaries about the 1938 Dersim massacre: Two Locks of Hair: The Missing Girls of Dersim (2010) and Unburied in the Past (2013).

In 2012, the two also published a historic book called The Missing Girls of Dersim , which contains more than a hundred stories as well as several documents detailing the painful experiences of the surviving children of Dersim, who were kidnapped by Turkish soldiers or bureaucrats following the massacre.

At the press conference organized during the premier of the Children of Vank , the director, Nezahat, said that it took them four years to complete the making of the documentary.

“We all know that historical truths are covered up, hidden and denied by the official ideology and the official history narrative in our country. Hence, it takes a very long time to chase the truths and reveal them,” said Nezahat. “It is hard to be a Kurd, an Alevi, a woman, a homosexual, a child—to be the ‘other’— in these lands… But being an Armenian is even more difficult. Armenians are seen as ‘the other of the other,’” Nezahat added.

According to Nezahat, the documentary is not just movie, it is what the filmmaker calls “a struggle for truth.” “I hope this movie will pave the way for revealing many other untold stories,” Nezahat explained. “And I hope it will help stop even greater sufferings and atrocities from taking place again.”